Disclaimer: Rurouni Kenshin is the creation of Nobuhiro Watsuki, with the manga and anime rights belonging to Jump Comics and Sony Entertainment, respectively.
White Friend
~ Melpomene & Shirodachi
Five
Sunshine escaped past the too-thin fingers reaching for them, flickered down to touch the shadowed woods, bounced from some places, devoured in some others, ultimately triumphant in reaching the damp earth, though too paled to heat noticeably. It was an old lesson to the trees; no matter how they towered, how their huge forms blotted out the skies, their reaching branches could only gather as much of the sun's life-giving rays. Those rays always danced away from their upturned leaves, thus giving other life forms the chance to thrive at the feet of the giants, feeding on left overs. Life down there was precious little-- but life, all the same.
Life down there was cool that morning, as was relatively the rest of the vicinity, for the day was a rare and mild summer one. However, Kaoru was not one of those enjoying nature's respite, despite being swathed by the light breath of the trees. In fact, she was hot, sweaty, breathless, and excessively aggravated.
No, it wasn't Kenshin's fault, she firmly decided. It was easy to blame everything on the humble rurouni; he'd accept it mildly. The man was utterly too sweet, too adorably irresistible to have him bear the brunt of the irritation her misfortune caused her. Still, he was the reason she had to run to town, run back from there, and pass through the wood's trail, all in secrecy. How could it not be his fault?
Kaoru had a perfect plan set for that day -- before he ruined it all. She was going to pick up Kenshin's gift that morning, taking her time to take the long walk to the pier and back home. Because of the incident last night -- the fact that he came home late and scared her witless to boot -- he promised to go home for lunch and cook her sukiyaki, the meal she had wonderfully ruined last night. No amount of sweet nothingness could talk him out of it, so she resigned herself to racing for home.
A notorious kick from within her knocked the breath off her throat. In fact, the baby had been active all morning, as if that early conspiring with his (or her) father and chastising his mother for sneaking out. Gasping, she slowed to a tired lagging walk. There was no sense tiring herself or the baby anymore, since she was going to be late anyway. Kenshin wouldn't be happy about it, but that couldn't be helped. At her state, he would not be happy at all.
Even so, on coming before the now distinguishable yard of the shack, she found her steps tapering to a stop. The incidents yesterday barely registered in her mind - her memories were to vague to make out anyway. Yahiko, however, directed another shaft of intrigue on the shabby hut. If it had been odd when he came home last night blissfully disregarding their inquiries, it was even more so that morning when he lethargically pried himself from bed and off to the Akabeko. He didn't even bother to dose her with his ever charismatic attitude before he left; it was as if he was too tired to act up, if that was possible. Worst of all, he had been evasive about where he got her parasol -- somehow that had to be the key. It had to be, since it caused a certain undefinable disturbance rise in her whenever she set her eyes on the umbrella. From what she was able to gather from the brief, confusing interrogation, Yahiko found her parasol in that house. Which still didn't explain his absence the whole previous evening.
Kaoru shook her head as she stood before the threshold in indecision. Maybe she was blowing the whole parasol business out of proportion. It was ridiculous to blame the play of her imagination, Yahiko's irresponsibility, and Kenshin's schedule on a mere parasol. She didn't remember using it the other day, so it must have been left at the shack; the owner must have given it to Yahiko yesterday. Anyhow, she left the parasol at home when she set out that morning.
What she was more interested in was what manner of person would ask a boy to stay that late. Yes, that was the inference she had arrived at: Yahiko must have been at that house all evening. The owner must have also known that it had been she who trespassed on the property. It was only proper for her to drop by and apologize.
Walking to the entrance without hesitation, she was startled by the newly-patched shoji. This time, she didn't just enter the doorway, slightly slid aside, open enough for her to pass through. Respectfully, she rapped on the wall -- not on the shoji. The contrast of the old frame against the clean white paper was interesting, but she didn't want to risk bringing down the whole thing. As she waited, she noticed an empty container sitting on the side, flaky white stains streaking from the rim, down the sides of the bowl. Scattered randomly on the same area were whitish stains-- these were of wax, not paste -- forming nameless shapes, the crinkled geometry of melted candles.
Aha! Maybe that was what Yahiko had been busy with last night. If so, she could forgive him for being late then and for failing to deliver Kenshin's message. Helping others was something the boy was wont to and something she encouraged. Now, if only she could confirm it with the owner...
The inhabitant was probably out again -- either that, or he couldn't hear her. Too impatient to wait any longer, Kaoru stepped in, ignoring both th ever-present creaking that accompanied her every step and the stern warning in her head that told her that entering without leave for the second time wasn't the smartest thing to do. Because the sun was directly overhead, light managed to sneak its way past the wraith-like shadows, suffusing the room with a musty, faded incandescence. Old, worn tatami lined the floor, she now noticed; few else could be found in that dusty room. Unabashed, she walked to the partition, stepping past it, and into the adjoining room. That was where she had gone to the last time, she realized, and found herself staring down at that piquing poem again.
Kaoru drew a long, deep breath and swallowed. The alluring calligraphy was still there -- but not the streak, not the ugly streak she marred the page with yesterday! How could that be?
Disbelievingly, she bent slightly to take a look, squinting. It was hard to see with the black flecks rushing from the corners of her eyes, that characteristic dimness one encountered at entering enclosed, poorly-lit places after being out in the sun for a long time. It was still not there, that blot of ink. She began to doubt her own shadowy memories. And she began to feel afraid.
A crash was suddenly heard; that sound of porcelain finding its death against the merciless floor, that last cry before falling apart caught her attention. Her eyes went at once to that space on the floor before in dreadful anticipation, expecting the sight of black liquid seeping into the tatami mat, lapping at her feet -- no, that she had broken before. The inkwell wasn't even in the table. The sound came from behind.
Kaoru spun to look but immediately froze. Someone had been in the room all along! And not just someone--people that were too busy to notice her. No wonder they didn't hear her knock... No. The wonder was that she didn't hear them.
It was a thin ceramic bowl that made the noise. The girl carrying it had dropped it in her haste and was now groping about its shattered remains, as if to gather the spilled water. A long wail interrupted her futile chore, and she went stumbling to her companion.
The other woman, lying supine on the futon with blankets pilled atop her, was obviously in the throes of a violent labor. Her panting raced in the tense atmosphere of the room, occasionally joined by sharp cries. Her face was red, sweaty; her hair spilled across pillows in tangled mass of chaos -- the same chaos that must be rampaging in the other girl's mind.
She was barely a child, Kaoru realized, a girl of about twelve or thirteen. Her black, black eyes were wide and frightened, owned by one merely victimized by fate.
"What must I do?" she cried urgently to the pregnant woman. "What can I do?"
"Jou-chan," the woman gasped out. "It's coming. Stay with me!"
"Me?" Kaoru squeaked.
But as if to make up for Kaoru's hesitance, the girl was swift to assure her assistance. "I'm here!" she called out. "I'm here, but what must I do?"
And me? Kaoru thought. What must I do?
Do nothing. A voice seemed to echo across her memories. The mama-san. That foolish girl had it coming. She didn't count the days well and drank the herbs too late. She will lose the child but not before suffering long and hard -- ample lesson for idealistic idiocy.
She will lose the child...
Fear surging through her, Kaoru brought her hands to curve protectively against her belly. Her child was still, so still -- was he afraid like her? Still, she remained frozen in place, for it was the only thing she could do. It was the only thing to do. She did not know what else.
The delivery was long and hard, but all she could do was stand there motionless, gripped with terror and panic herself. Blood. There was blood, blood everywhere. Red was all she could see, red that enveloped her sight, stained all. Red stained the tatami. It stained the blankets and the bed where the new mother, drained and exhausted, was resting. Her legs, too, were stained red.
The infant and the girl, with her plain kimono and simply-tied obi, stood in the center of all that mess; her jet black hair, straight and undisturbed, crowned her serenity. The girl smiled down at him gently, smoothing the gossamer hair from his damp forehead.
"Welcome," the girl murmured. "Fate had us share the same beginning. But I will help you, if nobody will. I will be your friend. I promise. Friends forever."
He remained there lying in her arms, still and silent. The girl gazed at him as he remained there unmoving; but then her dark gorgeous eyes slowly dimmed into the dullness of burnt-out coal. They slowly rose to regard her silent spectator. Her expressionless eyes came to meet shocked blue ones.
Profound sorrow first filled Kaoru, but it was swallowed too soon as horror sprung to grip her chest. Kaoru knew then, at the sight of those terrible eyes. She knew.
It was sudden. The girl simply wrenched her arms apart, totally pulled them from underneath the child. The infant instantly fell down, its lifeless limbs floating in the life-giving air for the first and last time, down in its descent to its grave. Kaoru, tears in her eyes and with a mournful cry, dove to catch the little one -- and clasped only emptiness in her shaking hands.
Red. Red and black everywhere. Red and black and a tarnished impure white. Everything coalesced into a puddle of colors, a puddle of sanguinary red, malicious black, and corrupted gray. Kaoru was crying too hysterically to stop.
But suddenly, she did stop.
There were voices, soft, hesitant, but eager voices. She strained to listen, searching for their source.
"Mother?" it said.
"Mother?" echoed another.
A chorus of tiny voices chimed out at the same time. Sniffling, Kaoru continued to look for those children but sadly shook her head to indicate her lack of understanding.
The disembodied voices began to cry.
"We thought you had come."
"You see, she never came."
"She was supposed to meet me!"
"No, me!"
"But she's here! She's here for me!"
"Aren't you her?"
"She already said no!"
"But maybe.."
"Yes."
"Will you?"
"To care for me?"
"And me!"
"Feed me, dress me. Cuddle me, too?"
"Oh, and me!"
There were giggles all around."
"For all of us then!"
"It's so lonely out here, see."
"We could be friends instead, if you don't want to be 'mother'."
"Yes! We can play!"
"You'll play mother!"
"Please?"
Voices. Voices all around. Voices all around raised in supplication. Kaoru's heart ached for them, ached to take them all into her arms and comfort them. She knew how it felt to have no mother. She knew what it meant to be so alone. And she ached for them.
"Where are you?" she asked hoarsely. "Please come out."
"We-"
"-dare-"
"-not."
"They-"
"-they."
"They'd take us!"
"Oh, it was horrible!"
"I'm scared."
"I was sleeping-"
"And then they came and took me."
"They took me too!"
"Oh, so scary!"
One by one, they came out, little boys and girls hiding in the shadows. Barely visible, they glided to surround her from all sides.
Kaoru wiped her face and tried to sound as mature and comforting as she could. "You're safe now," she said. "Nobody's gonna hurt you."
They came nearer, tentatively reaching out with their fragile little hands, still shrouded by that fog-like presence.
"Have you came to protect us?"
"Yeah, like her?"
"She takes care of us."
"But she get's lonely, too."
"Very lonely."
"And, oh, so angry!"
"Shhhh....." The admonishment came from all around.
"Hey, you can be her friend, too."
"Oh yes! You're as big as her."
"You can play with her."
"So will you stay?"
Kaoru rose from her knees slowly. Her limp arms seem to move from her side on their own, reaching out to those tiny voices in a welcoming gesture.
"You will?"
"You will come to us?"
"Will you?"
She took a step.
"Oh you will!"
"Where are you?" she asked.
"You're almost there..." they encouraged her.
"Come closer," chorused another group of them.
"Here! Here!"
But the fog, that smokey screen seemed to thicken around her. Half blind in the grim darkness, she groped to find her way, touching nothing.
"I can't find you," she said.
"Here," they answered. "Reach out your hands."
"Where?"
"Near."
She stretched her hands further.
"Here... Almost."
She strained.
"-there..."
She could feel them now, feel tiny fingers brushing against hers lightly, oh-so-lightly... feathery. The fog was lifting. She could almost pass through now. Almost...
But then...
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE, ONNA?"
The darkness shuddered and shattered. Kaoru spun around to meet her challenger headlong, a man with an old haggard face. His thin figure loomed against the light streaming from the open doorway. The whites of his huge cavernous eyes were stark against the shadows wrapped about him; the effect was startlingly malevolent. Kaoru could only gape at him in blank consternation.
"Well, woman?" demanded the deep, angry voice.
"I-I'm sorry," was all Kaoru could stutter. "I didn't know. I'm going now, sir. I'm really sorry."
She walked out of there in a steady pace, her legs too shaky to go any faster. Merely following her with his wild gaze, the man did nothing to halt her escape. She continued steadily to home, too fazed, too shaken to sort her thoughts.
But they were in there, anyway. Her thoughts swirled inside her, violently clashing and assailing each other, but producing not a single stream of coherent ideas. She paid little heed to them anyway -- even her child was calm and unmoving within her. She was only attuned to the still damp earth underfoot, to the occasional clump of brown speckled needles, to those dying in the forest floor.
"Kaoru?"
She jumped, a gasp coming to her lips. Kenshin came from behind her, as she turned around.
"Kaoru-dono," he said with a deliberately straight face. "Please watch where you're going. I don't think trampling sessha will be quite good for the baby."
"I didn't see you," she said. Her voice came out as a croak, so she cleared her throat. "I just went out for a walk."
"Sessha noticed de gozaru." There was a wry undertone to that.
She took the hand he offered. "I didn't intend for you to," she murmured.
Whether or not he noticed the clamminess of her hand, he gave no indication. Almost too casually, he asked, "So how are you?"
"Fine." Beads of cold sweat stood out from her pale skin. "I just went out for a walk," she repeated.
"Yes," he murmured, frowning slightly as she scrutinized her, touching the back of his hand to her neck and forehead. "Feverish. I should have asked Kowaji-dono to find somebody else last night."
Kaoru stared at him for a second before the meaning of his words entirely sunk into her brain.
"Uh... Kaoru-dono?"
"You idiot!"
She swatted his arm.
"Don't you dare start with that again! It's not your fault they asked your help to save the minister's gaijin visitor's daughter's cat. I mean, it is sort of deflating and all, but you are the only one who could sneak that high in pitch darkness -- how the heck did that cat manage to climb that far anyway? Besides, what does that got to do with anything?"
"Last night seemed to have aggravated you so. It must have some impact on your health. Remember what Megu-"
"My health?" Her voice was entering that inevitable crescendo. "And feverish? I am not sick!"
"You look and feel sick."
"The weather's ghastly. It's like a furnace here."
"On the contrary, it's rather mild today de gozaru. A ravishing day."
Kaoru sputtered, beginning to consider the pointlessness of their discussion. "I'm taking a walk. It's only natural my temperature's a bit high."
"True." He practically radiated benevolence. "Walks are good for the health -- but not when the person's isn't good enough from the start."
"Whaddaya mean my health's not- What did you say?"
"Oro." Kenshin blinked. "Which part?"
"That walks are good for the health?"
"But it's true, Kaoru-dono."
She sincerely tried to moderate her already elevated temper. "You approve, huh? So then why do you forbid me from going on walks by myself?"
"Forbid is such a strong word."
"Kenshin." Her inflection screamed millions.
"The Battousai is a rather possessive man," he told her seriously. "The thought of such unscrupulous eyes drinking in Kaoru-dono's sublime beauty could prompt him to emerge. We wouldn't want that, would we de gozaru ka?"
Kaoru's eyes narrowed. The evil, evil of those wide artless eyes before her was distracting her. Well, it was also pushing his luck. With a fierce battle cry, she drove a fist up his jaw for an exquisite smack. Her blow connected beautifully, but he caught her hand when she drew her arm back to deliver another one.
"Let's go home now, shall we?" he said, leading her by the captured hand.
Kaoru was again reduced to open-mouthed bafflement. He usually humored her with at least one plaintive "oro" per mock hit.
He smiled at her, a flash of amusement sparkling in his eyes. "Honestly, the sukiyaki's not that bad."
"Really?" Tears were actually sitting precariously in her eyes. Kaoru clung to his shirt with questioning belligerence. "I don't believe you!"
"Why am I always suspect?" Kenshin asked with a sigh. "It's really quite repairable, dear."
"You're only saying that."
"Yes," he said with flourish. "I'm not writing it to anybody, koiishi. My letters seem to have tendency to give out headaches, they tell me. Something about my handwriting
"But what did I do wrong?" she wailed. "I did everything the way you taught me. I did, I did!"
"Maa, maa. It's all in the timing, love. Let's discuss it at home, shall we?"
~~~~
Hidden in the shadowy interior of the destitute hut, a man stood watching the couple walk away. He had been shocked to find the woman inside -- even more when he saw that she was obviously in the family way. And that the red-head man who met her was the father of the one she was carrying.
The redhead. The redhead chilled him to his bones. That man had the strongest ki he had ever detected in his life, oozed with male essence, practically glowed with yang. The woman was strong in yin, too, though not comparably strong... But maybe, just strong enough to withstand it?
No matter. The critical part was that the redhead sired the child she was carrying.
This new development was making the situation even more serious. What started as a man's moment of weakness, a wistful ceremony, a useless gesture borne of passion and nostalgia, could be the destruction of others. The stakes were much higher now. The woman was in the family way; the powerful man was her husband. That only made his job more emergent. He had to act quickly.
Shaking his head, he slipped away into the trail and went his way, opposite that of the disappearing family.
~040603 23:57
To be continued...
Edited: 092803, 22:02:15
uploaded: 23: 23 11/4/2003
Notes: gaijin means "foreigner," i think. sorry, i forgot the exact definition.
To watermelon: wai! I'm glad you found this fic absorbing. We'll see who/what Shirodachi is later, ne? ^.^ don't worry. I'm not giving up on Shirodachi, er... the fic. I don't think it's the sort of fic that'll get popular here in ffnet, and I'm not really expecting it to be. ^^;; I regard reviews as a bonus but I learned not to rely on them as writing fuel. ^^;; LOL Thank you very much for the feedbacks. It's quite thorough, and at least I know that I'm succeeding so far in building the mood, setting up the tranquil beginings, and dropping clues...
To Kyo-Terayashi: wah... I'm sorry. I made a mistake in uploading Chapter 4 to the default chapter. That should have been prologue. -_-; Thanks for telling me. ^__^
minna: thanks for reading. always.
